Former Massachusetts senator discusses views on D.C., GOP

Thursday

Oct 31, 2013 at 12:01 AMOct 31, 2013 at 1:00 PM

Rudi Keller

Fidelity to every plank of the party platform should not be the litmus test for Republicans, former U.S. Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts told a gathering sponsored by College Republicans on Wednesday night on the University of Missouri campus.

To survive as a party, he said, the GOP needs tea party conservatives, moderates and liberals to provide ideas. Platforms deserve due respect as the views of the groups that adopt them, but they are not necessarily the views of all Republicans, he said.

"Why do we have to shove it down our throats and demonize and vilify people who don't agree on everything in it?" he said.

Brown was responding to a question from Sarah Walsh, vice chairwoman of the Boone County Republican Central Committee and state committeewoman from the 19th District. She asked him whether straying from the platform could mean "we lose our identity as a party."

After Brown finished, Walsh said she wanted her candidates to be true to what the party decides is important. "To me, it is a little confusing if candidates are identifying with a party but say you don't subscribe to what is in the platform."

Brown, 54, scored a surprising win in a January 2010 special election to replace the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, a Democrat who had represented Massachusetts for 47 years before his death. Brown lost a bid for a full term in November.

Since then, Brown has taken a position with the law firm Nixon Peabody, signed on as a contract commentator for Fox News and traveled as a paid speaker. He is not ruling out a return to politics but has not announced as a candidate for any office.

The recent government shutdown was typical brinksmanship that he felt powerless to stop while in office, Brown said in an interview. "People are tired of the division and rancor and the inability to get things done," he said. "It was like 'Groundhog Day': been there, done that, do nothing and then do the blame game."

The stock market and other economic indicators behaved as if it was normal, he said. "Being in Japan during all of this, it was embarrassing."

About 40 people, mostly students, attended the gathering. In his talk, Brown told a story about his parents' failed marriages, a life-changing encounter with a judge at age 12 after an arrest for shoplifting and his mother's struggles to support her family with welfare and low-paying jobs.

"That was there as a safety net so we could make it to the next level," he said.

Brown was repaid by conservatives when he supported food stamps and utility assistance for the poor by being called a RINO, or Republican in Name Only, he said.

Brown made light of his appearance in Missouri when his hometown Boston Red Sox were warming up to face the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 6 of the World Series. And he criticized President Barack Obama for tying up Boston traffic to promote the Affordable Care Act on the day of the game and for likening the federal program to the Massachusetts health overhaul initiated under then-Gov. Mitt Romney.

The federal health care law needs to be fixed, and Obama needs to admit it, Brown said. Taxpayers don't want to subsidize insurance coverage for families with incomes approaching $100,000, and the law is too intrusive, he said. "We don't need the federal government telling us what to do with our health care."

This article was published in the Thursday, October 31, 2013 edition of the Columbia Daily Tribune with the headline "Ex-senator discusses views on D.C., GOP: Republican Party needs many types, Brown says."

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